CR Mechanic + Missile Deabte = My trains of thought:
1) High CR = Proper Maintenance and/or highly trained and non-stressed crew.
2) Proper Maintenance = Things(tm) work like they're supposed to or perhaps better.
3) Trained Crew = Makes Things(tm) work a bit better than the spec.
Increased Missile ammo doesn't make much sense since missile launchers are designed with a set number of tubes. Even designs with a magazine are fixed in amount with how much a magazine can hold. Neither good maintenance or a good crew can fix that. However there is the following I can think of that reflect points (2) and (3).
A) If a launcher is maintained well, it could fire faster = small bonus to ROF for high CR?
B) A good crew (assuming the ship has spare ammo in storage and can access the launchers somehow) could theoretically reload the launcher under combat conditions = Low chance or rate to reload missiles.
(A) is the most logical and easily feasible. It's only be useless for single-shot missiles. (Single Reaper, Single Harpoon, etc.)
(B) would be problematic to implement as I think about it. I can definitely see it done on larger vessels with good cargo space. Frigates with low cargo sapce is a bust though. (Take the Hyperion for instance. I can't see that sucker carrying spare ammo despite the math in regards to cargo numbers). There also the problem with rate/chance of reload. That would be a balancing problem. Ammo levels vary greatly between launchers (Single shot all the way up to 100 for the rockets, not counting Expanded Racks.) An across the board rate will favor one ammo count over another. (Flat rate would favor low count, % rate would favor higher counts.) The other option would be to give each missile weapon its own bonus rate. That would be more numbers to remember, handle, and balance.
Now, for my own questions:
Alex, do you think any other ammo-based weapons will affect CR? I'm thinking mostly of Ballistics, but there are some ammo-based Energy-DMG type weapons. (AM Blaster or Mjollnir, for example). You'd need to reload ammo based weapons between fights, no? Technically, that would affect combat readiness. I imagine you kinda don't want to touch on that yet (if at all) since that could push players towards pure, unlimited-ammo Energy-type weapons.
On the flip side, might CR eventually affect ballistic ammo count if CR is too low between fights? Speaking of which: if battle are now in phases, will ammo levels at the end of phase one reflect in phase 2? Or will ammo be restored between phases/engagements?
Lastly, will we have visible supply consumption for missile ammo now? Supplies only have applied to crew, fleet repair, and fleet "maintenance" (for being over limits), yet not to the expendables/consumables known as ammunition. I ask the same if ballistic weapon ammo usage will affect CR and such at some later time (if at all). I just find it kinda strange that supplies really only consist of 2 things: Food (crew) and ship components (Fleet; think armor, wiring, conduit, etc.) Apparently ammo is freely available?